Closing

The end of a blog. I’m older, and marginally wiser, than I was when I began this whole thing, 4 ½ years ago. Then, I was focused on prenatal nutrition, and the challenge of taking care of myself. The care and feeding of yours truly is a theme that re-emerged every so often on the blog, which was otherwise a demonstration of how obsessive motherhood is: so many of my posts are consumed with concern about feeding Leo.

Maybe it’s because breastfeeding was such a battle, or because I’ve always been rather food-focused, but what to feed our son has been a subject of thought, concern, joy and inspiration since before he was born. Just today, I found myself on the subway girding my loins for another battle with Leo’s school about summer “field trips” to Burger King. The first run-in with those field trips inspired our Toddler Cooking Class series.

Toddler cooking classes marked the beginning of a career trajectory prompted by my outrage in our school food system: a path that took me from food writing doubts to being a lunch lady, to finally, in my fourth year of motherhood, deciding to change careers, though I’m still busy signing petitions like this one.

Full-time now for almost six months, I’ve continued to worry about feeding our family the good stuff, and fighting off the nefarious influences of all the bad stuff. I’ve relied on Nesting Recipes, like Mini Meatballs and Alphabet Noodles, and Fast Fixes, like this Rice Noodle Salad, to get us through the work weeks. And to be honest, I’ve simplified our weeknight dinners to such an extreme that some of them—say, Wednesday’s “breakfast for dinner night” can’t even be called dinner anymore.

But in a lot of ways, we’ve moved on. Other worries are pressing in, for us, and for Leo, who is full of questions about life, death, and the dragon under his school. We’ve been “buying a house” for over 6 months now, and finally seem to be moving toward closing. Tonight, long after I thought he was asleep, Leo asked if there would be toys and a bed for him in the new house. Moving is scary. The future keeps us up at night. And I’m sad to be closing this chapter of our lives, this mom recipe blog that has documented so much of the satisfaction and pleasure of our lives these first four years of parenthood, as well as the challenges. Thanks for reading, and may you enjoy many wonderful family meals.

--Mom Appetit

Zoe Singer is a freelance food writer and cookbook editor and co-author of The Flexitarian Table. Food Editor and blogger for The Faster Times, she tries not to eat for two now that her son is a toddler.